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THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Friday, December 6, 1968
Chicago: symbol of confrontation
Chicago, 1968, the stage for a contemporary American tragedy; a drama in which an American audience of every persuasion could find a symbol.
Chicago, the symbol of brutal oppression by the establishment.
Chicago, the symbol of rebellious and riotous youth.
To speak of Chicago as a symbol is not to speak of it as it is but as what it has become. The confrontation between demonstrators and police was a tragedy, of this there can be no denial. But the historical tragedy of Chicago will be manifested in its perpetuation as a symbol, a symbol that will further polarize an already divisive society.
It had been hoped that the Walker report on the Chicago violence would be a tonic with which to clear the air. Instead, the report has had a toxic effect. Not that the report is partial or unfair, it probably is as accurate an investigation as we will get out of the Chicago debacle.
But a fearful nation has reacted with emotion rather than reason. Protagonists and antagonists have seized on parts of the report and shunned or
ignored the remainder, police and legal authorities have questioned its credibility and challenged its authors, and Mayor Daley has given it a soft-sell endorsement.
A nation divided by class, race and age has come to rely more on dogma than on its rationale; where reason is needed, reaction prevails. Investigative committees, regardless of their composition and regardless of their findings, fall into general distrust.
James B. Conlink Jr., the Chicago police superintendent, dismisses the report's conclusion that it was a "police riot." Conlink calls it a distortion of history and is reported to have said, "The world knows who the rioters were."
The report on the Chicago convention violence will change few opinions, nor will it enlighten the darkened mind of a cynical public. It will only cement the uncompromising views of so many.
On the other side, the wounded cry of "remember Chicago" is printed on the placards of demonstrators and on the hearts of the alienated.
There is no way that one can justify the malicious actions of the minority of the Chicago police force that convention week. Similarly, there
can be no justification for the obscene epithets a minority of demonstrators hurled at police. But because police are vested with the power and responsibility of maintaining order in a society, the police must bear the largest burden of guilt when they are a party to the breakdown of order.
But to generalize and assign a villainous role to police or demonstrators is to depreciate the value of the report. To generalize in such an instance is to perpetuate the symbol that Chicago has become.
Although failing to make recommendations the report addresses itself to this problem. "But we urge the reader, in assessing these facts, to bear in mind that the physical confrontations in Chicago will be repeated elsewhere until we learn to deal with the dilemma they represent.
Clearly the report must be read, not to reinforce existing stereotypes, but to propagate understanding. Only in this fashion will Chicago cease to be a symbol. Then, and only then, will the answers be found to dispel the probability of another Chicago.
Richard Lundquist Assistant Editorial Editor
Kansan movie review
'Duffy's' dull
By SCOTT NUNLEY
You haven't heard much about James Coburn's new movie, "Duffy," and that's as close as you need to get to this bomb.
With capable supporting stars like James Mason and Susannah York, with a lively score and song by Barry Mann, and with all those miles of expensive Technicolor film to expose-how could Director Robert Parrish have made such a dull motion picture?
The missing ingredient, apparently, was one film editor with a sharp pair of scissors and a feel for the dramatic.
sharp pan of sensors.
At least half of "Duffy" is definitely carpet celluloid, perfectly created for the cutting room floor. The first half hour, for example, is an incredibly boring series of interiors, telling and retelling and (yes!) re-retelling the audience that: these two brothers are 1. oddballs and 2. put out by their domineering father.
In the course of this soggy domesticity, Miss York does manage to reveal the tricky conclusion quite obviously in a delicate bit of over-acting-if you are actually surprised by the twist at the end, take one slow step to the rear of the theater!
Sometimes, of course, a film can be saved by production work that is in itself entertaining.
that is in the interiors of your entertainment room.
"Duffy's" camerawork does have its high moments, shooting dreamy interiors at the exotic "Garden of Allah" cafe through a technicolor hashish mist—or pleasing the audience with an ornately mobile shot of York at her oriental shower—or a second of crowd-pleasing sleight of hand with shipboard mirrors.
But in general, the camera techniques are pedestrian and even occasionally amateurish. (Footage of Coburn's walking feet, for instance, is as cinematographically dead as come-hither looks.)
Potentially dynamic photography is thrown away when Coburn's elaborately pop-sculptured Tangiers' pad is not used for any visually wild scene, such as a strobe orgy. And again when the crucial raid on the oceanliner is staged, the possibilities of a colorful masquerade chase scene (a la "Pink Panther") do not develop.
chase scene (a la Pink Panther) - do not direct it.
It's understandable that newcomer James Fox might be a pretentious marionette-fop in his woodenly well-tailored role. But when the same film throws veteran James Coburn's talents away on this one-dimensional performance of an overaged hippie, we can begin to blame the man responsible for directing these disappointing actors.
actors.
Even given "Duffy" as it was filmed, any group of enterprising film editors should have scrapped the slow opening, and snipped the predictable anti-climax to one quick fade on Coburn's leathery grin.
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A student newpaper serving the University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas.
Published at the University of Kansas daily during the academic year except holidays and examination periods. Mall subscription rates: $6 a semester, $5 a year. Second class postage paid at Lawrence, Kentucky. All goods, services and employment are charged to all students without regard to their national or regional origin. Opinions expressed are not necessarily addressed to the University of Kansas or the State Board of Regents.
Executive Staff
Executive Staff
News Adviser George Richardson
Advertising Advisor Mel Adams
Managing Editor Monte Mace
Business Manager Jack Haney
Assistant Managing Editors Pat Crawford, Charla Jenkins, Alan P. Jones,
Steve Morgan, Allen Winchester
City Editor Bob Butler
Assistant City Editor Joanna Wiele
Editorial Editor Alison Steelmil
Editorial Assistant Richard Lundquist
Sports Editor Ron Yales
Assistant Sports Editor Bob Kearney
Feature and Society Editor Rea Wilson
Associate Feature Editor Sharon Woodson
Copy Chiefs Judy Dague, Linda McCreery, Don Westerhaus, Zahradnik, Marilyn Zoick
Advertising Manager Kathy Sanders
National Advertising Manager Pam Flaton
Promotion Jerry Bottenfield
Circulation Manager Barry Arthur
Classified Manager
Paperbacks
THE WORLD OF ROCK, by John Gabree (Gold Medal, 75 cents)—A paperback about rock music, with more than 100 photographs and text that describes the Monkees, the Beatles, Elvis Presley, the Rolling Stones, the Supremes, and all that bunch. In a pop-culture-conscious age such a book is likely to interest more than those who will be attracted to it by its garish psychedelic cover. It is pretty factual and detailed and not at all in the breathless style of movie magazines.
KARAMOUR, by Ariadne Pritchett (Gold Medal, 60 cents) —"Saved from the angry sea, she became the innocent prey of a danger even more terrifying than the horror she had just escaped." Wow.
Loyalty oath protest
It's not as if such a fine and free country and state would of itself enlist our loyalty, Kansas legislators seem a bit weary on this point and insist we "Swear to God" that we'll be loyal.
To the Editor:
In order to assure you all that Kansas and the U.S. are lands of freedom, justice and goodness, we state employees sign loyalty oaths and dedicate ourselves to these great ideals.
As they look over their waving wheat and see God in the heavens, these statesmen muse, "Let's get them state employees to sign loyalty oaths and keep things fine as they are. No sign, no pay." God, seeing the good work of his disciples of grain, continues to fill our legislature, overabundantly, as it were, with such wise and humane leaders.
Who do we have to thank for these oaths? State employees sign because it's that, or leave and starve. State employees can be placed in the ambitious coward's group.
Wescoe permits the oath because it is for the good of the University, although there is a rumor that he plans to take the oath to Washington to see how many signatures he can garner.
Docking is just one against many and anyway he seems to be more interested in forcing a disloyalty oath on Republicans, than in eliminating any loyalty oath. As for our freedom-loving legislators, they can take these damn oaths to the state outhouses and, I swear to God, use them appropriately.
Howard Hruby State Employe
'This is your captain speaking. We are experiencing some minor difficulty. Would everyone stick his arm out the window and flap vigorously.'